Isaiah Pead breaks away for a 50-yard touchdown run during the fourth quarter against Louisville on Saturday. / The Enquirer/Jeff Swinger

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Isaiah Pead is going to get his. There will be a gap, a sliver, a slice in the defense just big enough for him to dance through. And then he's nothing but tail lights.

It has happened so often, it must be so: First play, first game this year: Forty yards, touchdown. Second game, first carry, at Tennessee, 65 yards into all that orange-ness. Game 4, North Carolina State: 167 yards on 27 carries. And so on. Sooner or later, inevitable occurs.

The University of Cincinnati wasn't playing all that great Saturday against Louisville. No, check that. The defense was hulky, allowing no touchdowns, barely two yards a rush and keeping Cardinals freshman quarterback Teddy Bridgewater running around his backfield, seeking cover.

It was the offense that took its time to find the game. It was as if Zach Collaros & Co. had gotten lost between Clifton and Paul Brown Stadium. The first half was hideous. After three quarters, UC still trailed 16-14.

Pead hadn't done much: Twelve carries, 52 yards, more than two yards per carry under his average. He was missing cuts and holes. Louisville helped: The Cards have the best defense in the Big East, especially against the run. "Half was on them, playing good defense. Half was on me, making the wrong cuts," Pead explained.

But there's something about the very good players. It can be a little like the rope-a-dope Muhammad Ali played to perfection. It's part confidence, knowing that your talent is too sublime to be caged an entire game. As Pead put it, "You stopped me on this play, now stop me on the next play."

It's partly that. The rest is sheer ability. Pead ran track in high school. He was a sprinter: the 100, the 200, the 400. His best time in the 100-yard dash was 10.5 seconds. That makes sense. Because on 2nd-and-10 from the 50 Saturday, UC trailing 16-14 with 12 minutes to play, Pead ran 50 yards in half that time, or so it seemed. If it took him longer than five seconds to get into the endzone, it wasn't much longer.

UC coach Butch Jones said the play is designed, if it's blocked perfectly, to get eight or nine yards. The rest is virtuosity by the guy with the ball. Pead burst through the ‘Ville middle, then made a jump cut that left the safety with two broken ankles. The rest was sprinter's speed.

"You can only contain him for so long," Jones said. "He has the ability to make anybody miss, anywhere on the field."

Pead downplayed his effort. He said UC had run the same play a few times earlier, to no great effect, because "I kept missing the cut." His linemen told him to stay with it, the big play was there, but he had to make the cut. "They didn't steer me wrong," said Pead.

The run didn't win the game, but it came pretty close. Louisville had taken a 16-7 halftime lead, thanks to a Collaros interception that was returned for a touchdown. Even then, though, you figured the Bearcats for a comeback. If only the offense could get loose.

"Be perfect," Pead told himself after halftime. "Take it back to basics, everything we worked on in the offseason." He meant the technical stuff: The cuts, reading his blocks, performing the play the way it's drawn up. Get the eight or nine yards. "It's human nature to get frustrated," Pead said. "The coaches say, ‘Don't let a team beat you twice'," physically and mentally.

Pead stayed with it, as did his mates on offense. The dam broke. With Pead, it generally does.

So the Bearcats begin the Big East season with a win. A week of tedious, greedy-ous musical conference-building came to a satisfying conclusion. If it's Saturday, Boise State must be in the Big East. At least until Monday.

Jones praised the crowd of 40, 971, then declared it wasn't big enough. "We need to get more people here," he said.

Give it time. If UC remains in title contention a month from now, they'll do better at PBS, with West Virginia in town. Meantime, marvel at Isaiah Pead, who gets his.

"We wanted to pound the run. We wanted to make it hurt," he said. "We took their will away. In the fourth quarter, they didn't want to play anymore. There's nothing better than wearing them out like that."